It started as a simple trip to the beach, a ways walk out of town. We meandered, lounged, skipped rocks and enjoyed the sunshine and crystal blue waters. Restlessness hit us in gaggles, and over the course of an hour the large group slowly migrated from the rocky beach, along a windy cliff path to the scraggly hotel concrete and abandoned restaurant perches that dot that section of coastline. From there, a few of us jumped at the chance to explore one of Dubrovnik’s greatest war relics — the Hotel Belvedere.
Strengthened by curiosity and comforted that our friend, Marko, would serve as our local guide, we began climbing the terrace steps towards the hotel’s lower levels. Passing by magnificent tiles of long-dry swimming pools and brightly colored graffiti still damp from application, we enjoyed our own private re-construction of what Belvedere might have, or could, look like. We ran into a few, quite literal, roadblocks where the city had filled the entrances Marko and his friends had used as children. Undeterred from our adventure, we made our way up pathways, windowsills, trees and door frames until finally managing to gain entrance to one of the hotel’s lower bedroom hallways.
The soft carpet beneath my feet sharply contrasted with the harsh cracks in the walls, broken china, and vacant rooms of Hotel Belvedere. Simple, out of fashion wallpaper peeled from the hallways as if trying to escape this long-forgotten tourist hotspot. I lost myself in imagining how many men, women, children -- dressed for a dip in the pool and then afternoon tea -- ran their hands along these now faded walls. And as I watched my step for fear of broken glass or even gaping holes, I wondered how many times a young woman my age peered down at her own feet, trying not to trip in her slightly too high heels in this slightly too fancy hotel, on her way to an expensive dinner with a guy she’d like to impress with her (as of yet unperfected) ladylike charm.
Perhaps I’m getting a tad bit carried away in my historical romance, as the hotel itself was only constructed in the 1970s, and my mom and her friend Shona most likely sailed, swam, or walked right past this hotel on their travels here in 1987. Or perhaps they were the young women eating nicely in the extravagant hotel restaurant… though I doubt it from my mom’s tales of meals of baguettes, cheese and apples on the cheap. It was only a few years later, in 1991, the the hotel was partially destroyed in the bombing of Dubrovnik, only to be occupied by Yugoslav soldiers and later lived in by refugees and looted by locals in the years since.
We climbed stairs, stairs, more stairs, discovered hallways full of bathtubs, tiptoed through bedrooms scattered with collected china, and incurred a few too many frights incited by our own reflections in unsuspected bathroom mirrors. Eventually, we made our way into the hotel’s decadent restaurant, with a gorgeous tile centerpiece still intact and a concrete spiral staircase that had seen better days. The view, same as ever, blazed into the restaurant though what were once walls of glass and now remain as open windows to the sea 100 feet below. Almost at the highest point, we were determined to make it to the hotel’s roadside entrance, though it took a pretty long jump and some intense bushwhacking (by which I mean the bushes whacked us, not the other way around), to reach the summit. As always, breathtaking views of the Adriatic and Lokrum island greeted us from our elevated perspective. Satisfied and exhausted, we meandered back down the path to the beach singing classic disney songs about how “everybody wants to be a [dubrovnik] cat” (ha).
love from dubrovnik,
shonabell
